Best Productivity Apps Ios Mac

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Pages, Numbers, and Keynote are the best ways to create amazing work. Templates and design tools make it easy to get started. You can even add illustrations and notations using Apple Pencil on your iPad. And with real‑time collaboration, your team can work together, whether they’re on Mac, iPad, or iPhone, or using a PC. Best iOS productivity apps Whether it's taking better notes, keeping track of to-dos or working more efficiently with others, there's a productivity app for your iPhone that's sure to help you get.

Best productivity apps guarantee best working environment! Have you ever thought how much time do you waste on typing and clicking, organizing files, and trying to find the date? It’s time to put your laptop to work with this list of 15 best productivity apps for Mac.

Best Mac Productivity Apps

Sometimes you don’t need full-screen apps with lots of features to improve your productivity. Instead, have a look at these small tools that do one-two things and make your life easier.

1. Krisp

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Krisp is an easy-to-use but powerful app that recognizes your voice and separates it from extraneous noise next to you, leaving only your clean voice. It’s one of the best productivity apps for Mac that can help you to have better conference calls. You can work from any place that’s convenient for you and don’t worry about the crying baby or airport announcement in the background. Krisp also launched on Appsumo Deals.

2. Magnet

To be productive means having an organized workplace. Magnet app does exactly that – organizes the space on your desktop. This small app allows you to drag windows to show two, three, or four apps side-by-side.

Having multiple windows side by side eliminates the neebad for app switching and enhances your multitasking. Organize your workspace and seamlessly copy the text from one window and paste it into the second one. You can also customize the shortcuts for the app for maximum efficiency.

Price: $1.19

3. Itsycal

Have you ever wondered why your Mac doesn’t show full date on menubar? We have. While we don’t know the exact reason why Mac doesn’t support this function natively, we’ve found a good solution with this nice productivity app.

Itsycal adds a small calendar on your menubar. With it you can always have a brief glance at the whole month, week, your day and even appointments. It integrates with your macOS calendar and reminders, and you can modify the appearance if you wish too.

Best productivity apps ios macbook

Price: Free

4. Flux

Sometimes you have to work during night or in place with bad lighting. For these situations use Flux – productivity app for Mac that changes the brightness and color temperature of your display. It matches them with the time of the day, so you call work better and feel less tired.

Price: Free

5. SelfControl

If you can’t resist the urge to check your Facebook, Twitter or any other website you stick for hours – this tool is for you. SelfControl app helps us to save us from meaningless waste of time of these websites.

Simply add the websites which distract you from your work, set the timer and turn it on. The app will block the mentioned sites for the specified time.

The best part is that even if you reboot your Mac, you can’t turn off the application until the timer’s up. So if your “selfcontrol” is not enough, use this small tool to be more productive with your time.

Price: Free

Best Mac Productivity Apps – Useful Tools

1. OmniFocus 3

This productivity app is all about managing your tasks. OmniFocus has a clean interface and every feature you need to get stuff done. And its sleek design is simply a perfect match for your Mac.

Add all your projects, to-do lists into OmniFocus and track all details like dates, notes, files attachments. Also you can easily synchronize between your iPhone or iPad. Free up your mind from storing all your tasks and enemies of every good conference call.

2. Bear

One of mac productivity apps in this list is called Bear. It’s a beautiful and flexible note-taking app. It has all functions that you’ve wished the pre-installed Notes on Mac would had.

With Bear it’s super easy to jot down your notes on the go. Write prose and outlines, create to-do lists and reminders for yourself, and many more. The best part is that many functions of Bear are free and you can enjoy all the perks without spending much.

Price: Free ($1.49 monthly)

3. CleanMyMac X

CleanMyMac is a lifesaver for your Mac. It combines many optimization tools in single app. Monitor the performance, remove malware and clean up your macOS.

This is a must-have app for any Mac user if you want your device to be healthy. And you want it, right?

Price: One year subscription costs $49.95

4. Alfred

Alfred brings productivity to your fingerprints! This app for macOS boosts your efficiency by helping you search your computer and web with great speed.

You can use Alfred for multiple things. It allows you to open things, search for things, define and time them, easily calculate things and expand tests, contact people and manage clipboard and so much more. Definitely give Alfred a try and experience its possibilities.

Price: Free

5. 1Password

Have you ever forgotten your password? Now you really forget your passwords as 1Password will remember all of them for you. Using 1Password is super simple: just save your passwords and login to websites with a single click.

Besides, if you often have a hard time thinking of new and unique passwords – worry no more. 1Passwords has your back and it will create a strong password instead of you and sync between your devices.

Price: $2.99 monthly

Best Mac productivity apps – Utilities

1. Bartender 3

Have you ever wanted to organize the apps on menu bar? Now you can!

With Bartender 2 you can easily rearrange apps on your menu bar, hide them and even move to separate Bartender Bar. Give it a try and find out multiple variations of your menu bar.

Price: $15

2. AppCleaner

This small productivity app allows you to safely uninstall unwanted apps from your computer. As you know any time you install an application dozens of files are distributed throughout your System. Besides taking up much space, they leave traces which are hard to find with custom tools.

That’s why you need AppCleaner to clean up the mess and delete all traces of unwanted apps from your device.

Price: Free

3. Things

You definitely have a lot of things, right? Add one more “thing” to your list – Things app. This is a small and easy-to-use task manager which makes you truly productive.

If you’re tired of all big apps with dozens of features (most of which you don’t need), then Things is your choice. Give it a try!

Price: $49.99

4. MalwareBytes

Don’t believe people who say that you don’t need a anti-malware program on your Mac. While, there might not be a need for heavy-weight and cumbersome applications, Malware Bytes is all you need.

Malwarebytes Anti-Malware scans your computer, finds and removes code that lowers system performance or destroys your system. If your Mac is running slow and annoying adware and pop-ups keep coming, definitely install this app and revive your Mac.

Price: Free

5. Gemini 2

Sometimes you can’t find the exact file you need, but often times it turns out you have multiples of the same file. Finding and removing every duplicate file seems like a redundant task. That’s what Gemini is for!

Forget about the problem of duplicate files with Gemini. It spots duplicates and similar files, sees how they’re different and deletes the ones you don’t need. Gemini is smart and it learns all the time to improve the process. Sounds amazing, right? Get yourself mac productivity apps like Gemini and free up tons of space on your Mac.

Price: Free

Mac Productivity Apps Bonus: Email Analytics

This app is one of those mac productivity apps that will help you keep in track of and visualize your team’s email activity. It is private and secure and will let you to monitor and measure the email productivity of your team and other employees.

Email Analytics provides an opportunity to segment the teams which you need to monitor, and compare their analytics data to rule out the top performing members. You can see the analytics in real-time and the reports are updated frequently to ensure you get the most precise results.

Best

This is great for boosting your and your team’s productivity in the long run, so give it a try on your Mac. There’s a 14 day trial after which you will have to pay $15 per mailbox a month.

By now you should already have your Mac ready to took off and allow you to be your most productive self. Let us know in the comments which Mac app is your favorite!

Working from home (WFH, also called telecommuting or telework) is becoming an increasingly common practice. In 2020, the necessity to effectively work remotely is crucial to productivity more than ever. Here at Parallels, we refuse to pretend as if remote work is a new trend. In 2019, the Business Harvard Review proved that remote employees are found to be more productive, have a lower chance of turnover, and are healthier in both their mental and physical well-being.

However, there is a delicate balance between working from home and effectively working from home.

This delicate balance boils down to the applications an individual could use to stay productive.

For macOS users, there is a nearly never-ending list of native features and apps to help stay on task. The team here at Parallels has researched far and wide to narrow down the most useful macOS apps for everyone who is working remotely.

Here are the best macOS applications to help stay productive when working from home in 2020:

Utilities:

  • Parallels Toolbox
  • Alfred
  • Google Chrome
  • Snag-it

Project Management:

  • Task Paper
  • Todoist
  • Asana

Knowledge Workers:

  • Parallels Desktop
  • BBEdit
  • Grammarly

Communication:

  • Discord
  • Microsoft Teams

Mood-Boosting:

  • Spotify
  • Swift Playgrounds
  • Yack for Reddit(in beta)

Breaking down our list into categories makes it a bit easier to find the app you’re looking for considering the vast landscape of available macOS apps. Now, let’s deep dive into how these macOS apps can make your work from home experience more productive.

Utilities Must-Haves for macOS:

Parallels Toolbox

Parallels Toolbox is a suite available of macOS of one-click tools that make everything easier. We do mean everything. While there are dozens of tools within Parallels Toolbox, I want to outline the specific tools used to help make my work from home life more productive. The tools Alarm, Stopwatch, and Timer are all fantastic for time management. During meetings, the Alarm Tool has found to be wildly helpful to stay on task – individually, and I can present without continually looking at the clock and becoming distracted. The Stopwatch tool in Parallels Toolbox is excellent when managing a large meeting. This tool gives each presenter the same amount of time, making it helpful to be respectful of everyone’s time and collective voice. The Timer tool has become necessary when it comes to time management because I give myself an allocated time for a task before moving to the next item on my to-do list.

There are a few more tools hidden in Parallels Toolbox that makes working from home a breeze. The tool, Energy Saver, can be used automatically when disconnected from the charger or when you enable it manually. Energy Saver consists of several different options to prolong a computer’s battery life by optimizing resource consumption such as pausing non-essential processes such as Spotlight indexing, AppStore updates check, and macOS updates check. Additionally, Energy Saver is intelligent enough to eject external devices, pause Time Machine backups, and hide non-active (idle) apps. It makes the hidden applications go to the built-in macOS App Nap mode, where they consume very little energy.

Pro tip: Parallels Toolbox tools Hide Desktop or Presentation Mode are game-changers during presentations. The Hide Desktop tool hides all the files, folders, and other icons on your desktop when you’re doing a presentation, sharing or recording your screen, or taking screenshots with one click. If you’re worried about push notifications that you may have enabled, your Mac going to sleep, or distractions from bouncing icons in your macOS Dock, check out the Parallels Toolbox user favorite, Presentation Mode. This endlessly helpful tool disables distractions for a better presentation experience. The Presentation Mode tool can automatically detect external displays and turn them on, too. Also available for Windows 10, but more Parallels Toolbox tools are available on macOS.

Alfred

Alfred for macOS is an award-winning app that can seriously boost productivity with efficient hotkeys, keyword shortcuts, quick text expansion, and so more, based on your needs. Similar to macOS Spotlight, Alfred enables an intelligent search through macOS and the web and encourages users to be more productive with custom actions to extend and automate the efficiency of your work on your Mac.

The team at Alfred also offers an additional add-on, the Alfred Powerpack. You can instantly enable more profound control your Mac with the Powerpack’s third-party app integration such as iTunes, 1Password, Shell. Plus, endless workflows and themes that make staring at your computer screen for 8-hours a day more enjoyable.

Google Chrome

Readers may laugh at a suggestion of a web browser to help boost productivity. Still, there’s a lot of power in Google Chrome that some primary users may not know about or be utilizing. While I was researching the best extensions for Google Chrome, I came across a supremely helpful article from Kyle Pearce over at DIYGenius. Kyle has an extensive list of useful Google Chrome extensions to stay productive, and I urge you to check it out ASAP.

My absolute favorite extension to Google Chrome was UBlock Origin, a free and open-source, cross-platform browser extension for content-filtering such as ad-blocking. However, the ad-blocker Kyle mentioned Ghostery is next-level and I believe it performs better on Google Chrome than UBlock. I’ve already made the switch, and I suggest you do, too!

Snag-it

I first stumbled upon Snag-it back in 2018 when a coworker here at Parallels suggested it to me for a presentation. It felt like just another tool to create a screenshot. Wow, I was SO wrong. In 2020, Snag-it is outperforming any other screenshot tool I’ve tried and has the smoothest user experience I’ve felt in a long while.

To summarize, Snagit lets you quickly capture a process, add your explanation, and create visual instructions without any frustration. How to permanently remove apps on mac. Truly, I cannot emphasize how excellent Snag-it is at transforming your communication. You can save hours of your time to help visualize your ideas in ways other people can easily understand. Not to mention, my favorite feature of Snag-it is the panoramic capture. Capture wide, horizontal scrolls, scrolling webpages, and everything in-between.

Project Management That is Easy to Use:

Task Paper

TaskPaper is a plain-text to-do list that’s surprisingly adept and thoroughly modernized. Since 2006, TaskPaper has delivered an excellent and easy to use to-do interface. This tool makes keeping your lists, searching with palettes to filter your never-ending lists, scheduling future dates/events easier than ever.

Not to mention, the clean UX makes for a distraction-less experience. While the minimalistic UX makes Task Paper look a bit bare-bones, this intelligent to-do list is packed with much more than just a simple interface.

Todoist

Todoist is used by over 20 million users to organize, plan, and collaborate on projects, both big and small, since 2007. While Todoist isn’t exclusive to macOS due to support via a mobile and web interface, it’s been a favorite of mine for years now. Why? Well, they also have a Google

Chrome plug-in that has enabled next-level multitasking habits.

With extensive access to over 60 integrations with some big hitters like Google Drive, Dropbox, Zapier, Evernote, and Slack – Todoist will quickly become your hub for getting work and life organized. Plus, their Wunderlist importer can help you switch tools and get started in just a few minutes if you’re looking for a change. If you’re working across multiple Macs or devices, Todoist makes it easy to pick up and continue crossing your tasks off your plate!

Asana

Asana is a widely adopted project management system that allows project managers or individuals to map out each step and organize all the details of your work in one place. Many small, medium or large enterprise companies utilize Asana, Parallels included. Here at Parallels, we love Asana! With the ability to create tasks that are dependent on other tasks, it makes coordinating with your team a breeze.

Truly, Asana has quickly become one of my favorite collaboration tools. Simply because of the ability to visualize multiple stages of projects quickly, easily, and the beauty of the UX makes this for a refreshing project management system. Simplifying workflows means reduced errors, and ultimately, saving time for solving more essential problems means I can get to work quicker. Every day, I log in, see my projects, and act accordingly. Asana has vast integration across many systems such as JIRA, Salesforce, PowerBI, Slack, Tableau, Adobe Creative Cloud, and they’re adding new features often.

Knowledge Workers Need the Following:

Parallels Desktop

Parallels Desktop for macOS has been used by millions globally to run Windows, Linux, or other popular OSes on Mac without rebooting. Virtualization serves healthcare to accounting, IT, CAD, creativity, and every industry in between. Parallels Desktop supports users to utilize the software they need on the hardware they already have to ensure you can get your job done faster without buying a second or third computer.

Since 2006, macOS users get the best of both the Mac and PC worlds on one device while you’re working remotely with virtualization. The best part? Parallels Desktop has thousands of supported applications within Microsoft Windows so that every industry can be supported. Plus, a free 14-day trial makes it easy to see if your specific needs are served with a virtual machine in Parallels Desktop. Not to mention, 24/7 support and our 30-day money-back guarantee.

BBEdit

BBEdit has one of the best marketing slogans, “It doesn’t suck.” And the reason why it’s one of the best slogans is that the product rings true and serves a consistent level of quality that is hard to match. While this specific suggestion is more particular to those who need HTML or plain-text editors for macOS, it is powerful because of everything else it can do for you.

Best Productivity Apps Ios Mac Os

BBedit has been crafted to serve the specific needs of writers, devs, and provides endless features for editing. For a power user, the advanced search, manipulation of prose, source code, managing bash data, and textual data is all wrapped up in BBedit. Apple apps won't connect to internet on mac. To be clear, BBEdit is not a word processor. However, it can replace several apps on your Mac to become one of the most invaluable macOS apps in your arsenal.

Grammarly

Grammarly is easily in my top five favorite apps of all time. Why? Simply because of the copious amount of time it has saved me during my writing process.

Grammarly is the best writing assistant available that goes much deeper than surface-level grammar to offer you comprehensive feedback on your writing. On the technical side, Grammarly is simply a digital writing tool that uses a combination of artificial intelligence and natural language processing. Read: it makes the writing process more comfortable and much less painful.

Communication with Your Friends or Work Team:

Discord

Consider Discord to be my macOS guilty pleasure of choice. While it’s also available for Windows PC, the macOS app is clean. It allows me to connect with friends or coworkers without frustration. Creating my private server or linking to my friend’s server makes everything separate and easy.

Productivity Apps Ios

Discord lacks the messy UX that most other chat services offer. Sharing your gaming, your work, or whatever you need to share on your screen, is also cleaner than most other communication apps. Not to mention, it’s cheeky copywriting within the app makes me smirk every time I launch the app, making it easy to want to continue to use it.

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams is the professional-grade communication tool that my team wanted but didn’t know we needed until we had it. The ability to chat, meet, share, call, and collaborate from anywhere as a global team has increased our productivity ten-fold within the first couple of weeks we started utilizing MS Teams.

It’s not just a communication tool, either. Microsoft Teams is robust enough to support calls, workflows, and meets industry-specific compliances such as healthcare or education. With our world evolving to a fully global digital landscape, Microsoft Teams is here to save the day with endless productivity. Microsoft said it best, with Teams you can work remotely without feeling remote – and it rings true through my personal experience.

Mood-Boosting to Keep Your Brain Productive While Working.

Note: While this blog post is explicitly surrounding the topic of productivity while working remotely, it’s imperative to mention the balance that goes behind productivity. Working your brain without breaks for fun is an expressway to burnout. Let’s avoid burnout by taking fun breaks with these following apps:

Best Productivity Apps Iphone

Spotify

Spotify has always been my music-platform of choice due to release exclusives and social components, but Spotify is a secret weapon to a productive day for several reasons. Firstly, Spotify’s market share is massive, so that you can listen everywhere. From speakers to tv’s, cars, gaming, smartwatches, smart displays, and all the best personal assistants. Secondly, their licensing options are fantastic. Of course, Spotify comes free with ads.

However, if you’re looking to ditch the ads for a distraction-free listening experience, Spotify has several subscription options. Spotify Premium has several levels to the membership: Premium, Premium Family, and Premium Student.

What are the differences in Spotify Premium memberships?

Spotify Premium:

  • Unlimited high-quality streaming access to over 50 million songs.
  • Travel abroad with no limitations.
  • No ad interruption.
  • Unlimited skips.

Premium Family:

  • Up to 6 family members who live together
  • Each member has their own Individual Premium account, so there’s no need to share login details.
  • Plus Family Mix – a playlist based on the tastes of everyone on the plan.
  • Plan managers can control explicit music for members.

Premium Student:

  • 50% off discount
  • Lasts 1 year at a time, with a 4-year limit.
  • Available to students at an accredited college/university, verified by SheerID.
  • Access to Hulu’s ad-supported plan and SHOWTIME for no extra cost.

Swift Playgrounds

Android Productivity Apps

Swift Playgrounds from Apple is an un-matched method to learn how to code. While it is available to both Mac and iPad, taking a break from your day to day to build with Swift Playgrounds adds a fun dimension to your overall productivity. It’s perfect for new-to-coding beginners and utilizes gamification to grasp the core basics of Swift – Apple’s powerful programming language.

The best thing about Apple is their curiosity for innovation and Swift Playgrounds continuously releases new integrations such as robotics, LEGO® MINDSTORMS® EV3, and even augmented reality (AR) to master our real 3D world. Apple is smart and understands as you learn, you’ll want more to play with. Because of this, Apple offers a variety of fun devices to shop.

Yack

Yack hasn’t quite hit the market yet. However, if you sign up for the beta, it’s clear why Yack is a must-have for macOS Redditors. Without opening your web browser, you can explore your favorite Reddit communities from a single elegant desktop app with a unified user interface.

Also, if you spend the day scrolling through YouTube, Yack also allows you to browse YouTube using the same beautiful, intuitive UI you use to browse Reddit. It’s an excellent and refreshing way to take a short break and check in on what’s going on outside your remote working space.

Top Apps For Mac

The remote workday is envisioned with multiple hurdles of obstacles without any allowance for sanity. macOS users need flexible apps that are easily managed, quickly absorbed, and serves the need of the moment.

The best macOS apps for productivity during remote work should consistently serve the everchanging needs of the digital worker. It is not always easy to craft the best environment for productivity during working remotely. Still, I sincerely hope this list has helped you sort through the hundreds of thousands of macOS apps that are available.

Please, let us know what you think or if you have any suggestions for our list of the best macOS apps for productivity when working from home. Reach out to us on Facebook, Twitter, or in the comments below!